President Bush
to athletes: Be my drug-free hero
Touching All Bases
By Bobby Moore
[email protected]
Sports Columnist
On January 20, during his State of the Union Address, President Bush laid out a challenge.
This challenge was not directed towards the military who are risking their lives overseas. It did not involve the economy. It was not even directed at NASA, who is spearheading Bush's �Plan 9 to Outer Space.�
The leader of the free world challenged the professional sports leagues and their players to stop their use of performance-enhancing steroids.
The NBA and NFL are already handling substance abusers properly and have been doing so for years and their players face the consequences if they do not abide by the rules.
Only baseball has a perceived steroid problem, and as a former team owner Bush should know that baseball can police itself without any help from the government.
Bush led into the topic of steroids by saying, �To help children make right choices, they need good examples. Athletics play such an important role in our society, but, unfortunately, some in professional sports are not setting much of an example.�
Not this again. I think Charles Barkley said it best in a Nike ad back in 1993 when he defiantly said, �I am not a role model.�
Barkley was not trying to add street credibility to his image; he was merely using common sense. Parents, teachers, relatives and other adults are the real role models for children.
One baseball star that more than likely took his fair share of enhancing drugs was Jose Canseco. I know he's done a lot for charities, which is admirable, but if we are going to depend on Canseco to show our children how to behave as an adult, then this society has worse problems than the economy.
Sports figures may be on the big stage making millions, but that does not make them role models. The greatest NFL player of all time in my opinion is Jim Brown. He was a great running back and also a legendary lacrosse player. That being said, who in their right mind would want to be remembered as a man who allegedly beat a woman?
Brown is not alone. Daryl Strawberry and Mike Tyson also come to mind when the subject of spousal abuse is brought up.
Evander Holyfield, Shawn Kemp and numerous other sports stars have fathered children with multiple women. Others like Ray Lewis and Pete Rose have faced the consequences of running with the wrong crowd.
My father, on the other hand, grew up as a sharecropper and has had to work hard all of his life to give my brother and me an opportunity to be successful. As a man who has followed in his very successful father's footsteps, I would think that Bush would share my philosophy about who the true role models are in this country.
Before the technological age dawned several years ago, it was possible to make sports stars into role models. Legendary University of Oklahoma head football coach Bud Wilkinson was admired by both adults and children in the 1950s, but in the age of the Internet and cable television his womanizing ways would be common knowledge.
If anyone should know about having their present and past vices viewed under a microscope for the entire world to see, it should be politicians. We all know about Lawrence Taylor and Kobe Bryant's legal woes, but we also know about Bush's DUIs and Bill Clinton's numerous sex scandals.
Punk rock pioneers The Stranglers once sang, �Whatever happened to the heroes?� There still are heroes in this world. They are the people who can make a difference, and sadly they are not on the playing field or in Washington |
